


The Warrior, the Anarchist, and the Scribe

by Daughter_of_Words



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Eventual Relationships, Gen, POV Second Person, Reader-Insert
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-13
Updated: 2021-03-18
Packaged: 2021-03-21 15:47:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30024096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daughter_of_Words/pseuds/Daughter_of_Words
Summary: It hurts more than it excites you to remember how many mortal lifetimes have crested and fallen in your long existence.  It had thrilled you, once upon a long ago time, to watch them grow old and peaceful.  It had satisfied something deep inside you, warmed you from the ribcage out.  That heat had quickly been cooled by the realisation that it didn’t matter how bright they burned or how unique the colour of their flame.  The mortals were all leftempty, cold, and unmoving in the end.When that icy truth gripped you tight enough to leave dark welts across your heart, you left your settlement.Abandon them,a Voice had whispered,before they get the chance to abandon you, to question why you and not them, why you and no one else.Because youarealone, aren’t you?
Comments: 27
Kudos: 38





	1. The Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> The characters described within are depictions of fictional characters portrayed by content creators on the Dream SMP. These characters are not meant to represent real people or reflect any real person associated with them.
> 
> This will hopefully be a multi-chaptered work. It has not yet been fully edited, so please expect small changes.

It was never hard for them to tell that something about you was different.  
  
“Old eyes.”  
  
“Old soul.”  
  
“Old blood.”  
  
And old you are, though you can’t recall when you last had kept count of the seasons. It hurts more than it excites you to remember how many mortal lifetimes have crested and fallen in your long existence. It had thrilled you, once upon a long ago time, to watch them grow old and peaceful. It had satisfied something deep inside you, warmed you from the ribcage out. That heat had quickly been cooled by the realisation that it didn’t matter how bright they burned or how unique the colour of their flame. The mortals were all left _empty,_ cold _,_ and unmoving in the end.  
  
When that icy truth gripped you tight enough to leave dark welts across your heart, you left your settlement. _Abandon them_ , a Voice had whispered, _before they get the chance to abandon you, to question why you and not them, why you and no one else._ Because you _are_ alone in this, aren’t you? How many people have you come across in all your years, and not a single one of them has ever outwitted death. And so, despair still tearing wounds into your chest, you had fled with the dawn and a thick tome, a diary, a record of your most precious friends, carefully tucked into the bottom of your inventory.  
  
You’d reasoned, alone and miles away from the only place you had called home, that if it was in their nature to live such devastating glimpses of existence, then it ought to be in yours to isolate yourself from the heartbreak that came with witnessing them. Your self-imposed exiles last a few decades at most before that little Voice steps in to persuade you to drink in the company of mortals, to tame the loneliness scratching at your bones. 

That same scratching compels you to make records of the most unique of them. You have centuries of books dedicated to the ghosts of those who had entranced you in one way or another. Some mortals, after all, deserve to be more than faded memories that deteriorate on the tides of death, and you…

Well, you’ve always been able to walk on the waters of life without the fear of drowning. 

* * *

Your latest exile had gone on for too long. By the time that the Voice had managed to furiously instruct you to head for civilisation, your nails were unconsciously scraping angry purple welts down the soft flesh of your arms.  
  
 _Mortals_ , it had snarled at you during a brief moment of lucidity, _take your chest and find mortals_.   
  
It’d taken you three days of horseback travel, almost mindless with the need to see others and be seen yourself, to reach a town. When you had slumped, exhausted, into a seat in the only tavern for miles, the scratching had gentled to mere caresses beneath your skin. The drink-merry voices of the locals had soothed you, and it wasn’t long before one of them – a young, cheerful barmaid with a head of scattered curls – had approached and asked if you needed a room for the night.  
  
That had been a month ago. Now, you’re settled in a previously abandoned cottage a few miles out of town. The first thing you build is a single-stall stable for your horse. He has almost forgiven you for the gruelling three-day trek he had endured to deliver you to the mortals unscathed.   
  
The house itself is clean and airy now. You’ve cleared out the spiders, repaired the broken window shutters, rebricked the fireplace, and your Ender Chest, where all of your books and most precious items are stored, is hidden beneath the stone tiles that cover the floor.   
  
It isn’t the first time you’ve played house on the boundaries of a mortal town. For now, you’ll pretend that it’s the last, that you won’t (once again) be driven away by grief, that you won’t be repeating the _exile, desperation, contact, loss, exile_ cycle in a few decades.   
  
Tonight, you’re languishing at a table in front of the tavern’s fireplace, bathing in the voices of tired townsfolk relaxing after a day of work.   
  
With the exception, of course, of a young man cheerfully strumming a guitar while sat atop a table.  
  
“Some energy, my friends, would not go amiss!”   
  
“Gods help you if you scratch that table, Lynus,” Meli says as she passes him, and the strumming stops long enough for Lynus to snatch a mug of mead from the tray she’s carrying.  
  
“What is there to be energetic about?” Calvus, the temperamental man who owned the tavern and did a majority of the cooking during the day, leant against the bar and frowned up at Lynus. “Have you been hearing stories again?”  
  
“That I have, that I have!” Lynus says with an excited gesture towards the door. “I’ve been hearing about some _explosive_ politics in L’Manberg—”  
  
“Oh, sod off, Lynus,” an elderly gentleman growls from a seat at the table Lynus is perched on. “No more L’Manbergian politics. It’s a mess and a bore.”  
  
“Isn’t it just Manberg?” one of the girls who had been openly admiring the guitarist whispers to her friend. “Didn’t the name change?”  
  
“I thought it was Pogtopia.”  
  
“Come on, then!” the elderly man says, knocking twice on the table to get Lynus’ attention back from the whispering girls. “You’re s’posed to be entertaining. Give us a _decent_ story!”  
  
“Aaah, you wish to hear of legends!” The guitarist stands up on his table, arms wide with aplomb. “Then allow me, dear sir, to be the one to deliver you far from the _politics_ of man and into the arms of _gods_.”  
  
A hooded man seated at the other side of your table snorts into his mug. He’s a familiar figure, though you can’t yet say you’ve managed to glimpse his face. He wears a hooded cape lined with thick white fur that hides him from view. You often find yourself sharing a table with him – you assume it’s because you’re both near-silent.   
  
“What do you know,” Lynus’ theatrical voice calls to the room, “about the two men who conquered the south?”  
  
“Two! Don’t be ridiculous!”  
  
“Will you let the man tell the damned story?”  
  
“I can’t claim to be an expert,” Lynus insists with a mouth coated in mead, “but I’ve heard many a tale of the immortals that wander among us.”  
  
“Immortals?” The girls are whispering excitedly between themselves again.

You hold yourself back from the edge of your seat as if it is the precipice of a ravine. _There are no others,_ the Voice states, _there are no others. There is no one else. You’re alone._  
  
“Older than time,” he insists firmly. “Older than the records we can read.”  
  
You’re struggling to hear the hubbub over the drumming of your pulse in your ears.  
  
“Get on with it, man, you’re keeping us on tenterhooks!”  
  
“There are legends about immortals, and these two men more than fit the tale. It’s as if they’ve defeated _time itself_ alongside the dozens of armies they’ve felled along the way.”  
  
 _Don’t_ , the Voice warns you sharply, _don’t get excited.  
  
_ “One is known as a god of death. He bathes in destruction, revels in it, enjoys the chaos. The other is a god of war. He acts like a vassal, a protector, immensely skilled with a sword and shield, but a superior mind above all.”  
  
“ _Blood for the blood gods_ ,” a woman chimes in from her seat at the bar, mug lifted in a toast. “That’s what they say: blood for the blood gods. Let one bleed you dry and the other will laugh over your corpse.”  
  
“Quite right, my lady!” Lynus raises his own mead with a huff of laughter. “Blood for the blood gods! Blood for the men who will let you scream sweet nothings to their swords, to the edges of the blades they fell you with.”   
  
“Surely we’d know if it was true. Right?”  
  
“There are always rumours.” He hands his newly emptied mug to one of his companions and hops off the table. He strides purposefully to the door. “South, hundreds of miles away, a pair of men who conquered unimaginable miles of land alone, and _not_ unchallenged. Then, one day, just gone, as if they’ve dipped out of living memory.”  
  
“Two immortals,” Calvus scoffs from the bar. “Only two?”  
  
“That we know of,” Lynus says, and he holds up three fingers, “but there is suspicion of a third.”  
  
“Tell us, please!” Meli prompts him, and her cheeks glow pink when he turns his attention to her.   
  
“I have heard only _one_ mention of her,” he nods, and he lifts the guitar slung against his hips, held up with a woven strap around his neck, “and it is so starkly different to the others.”  
  
He starts to pluck out a tense, mournful tune.   
  
“There’s the Warrior, the one who delights in destruction. There’s the Anarchist, the one who savours the art of violence.”  
  
“And the last one? The third?”   
  
“The Scribe,” Lynus says, and you suddenly feel like you’re the only one here who understands why he holds so much _pity_ in those two words. “The one who cherishes the mortals and all they know. Supposedly, she writes books upon books about the world as she watches from afar.”  
  
“She?”  
  
You find yourself suddenly choking on a gasp.   
  
The green-clad man at your table turns his head toward you. You manage a wan smile and lift a hand in apology for the noise.   
  
“A lonely wanderer, apparently,” Lynus says gently. “She’s always alone. She hides from the world, so they say, because what does an endless lifetime mean if you spend it mourning? Empires rise and fall, settlements grow and wither, countries are conquered and liberated, and she just… _exists_ on the edge of it all. She writes about the few mortals she allows herself to grow attached to.”  
  
“Why?”  
  
“Because some deserve it, and because it must be a lonely existence to traverse, no? Imagine watching everyone around you fade away in the aether. We immortalise those we love in story and song, but we all eventually join them in death. She doesn’t have that luxury.”  
  
“All this time, alone,” Meli mutters, crestfallen, “and she doesn’t even have the others to share it with?”  
  
“There’re no tales of her encountering the others,” Lynus says, softening at Meli’s morose expression.  
  
“Perhaps it’s deliberate,” the elderly man adds hopefully, “to protect her.”  
  
 _Keeping you away, keeping you lost, keeping you lonely. You’ve never deserved companionship that you won’t outlast.  
  
_ “The other two are violent and bloody,” Calvus says, “perhaps she’s avoiding them.”   
  
“Or they’re protecting her, like our friend here suggests.” Lynus shrugs his shoulders, and the melody trails off with a high-pitched whine. “Wouldn’t you? She’s a peaceful, faceless creature to the world, and surely there’s got to be _danger_ in having an aeon of knowledge in your possession. We couldn’t begin to imagine the kind of information she has written in her own personal library. The others keep low profiles, but there’s always a trail of destruction behind them, intentional or not. They could be right outside the door and we wouldn’t know it until it was too late, but we’d _know_ it. With her, not so!”  
  
“A trail of destruction, he says,” your hooded tablemate murmurs lowly to you, and you have to cover your startled flinch by grasping onto the untouched mug of mead in front of you. When you look up at him, a pair of green eyes are coldly fixed on you. “Maybe they’d destroy her and leave her behind too.”   
  
_Leave_ , the Voice is too loud in your head now, too pressing. _Get out. Go home. Danger._  
  
You don’t wait to be asked again.   
  
It isn’t until you’re astride your horse, clinging to the reins as you urge him _faster_ along the dirt path that’ll lead you home, that the Voice stops commanding you to _run_. 


	2. Any Fool Can Know, But Few Can Understand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> That night, in front of a hastily stacked coal fire, you drag your Ender Chest out from beneath the tiles and start a painstaking hunt through centuries of handwritten notes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I should most definitely be writing my university assignment and not this, but Quackity's stream was wonderfully inspiring, and I am but an influenced writer. 
> 
> I do not feel like I've done this justice at all, but I hope you enjoy all the same!

That night, in front of a hastily stacked coal fire, you drag your Ender Chest out from beneath the tiles and start a painstaking hunt through centuries of handwritten notes.   
  
Your tears taste like torture when you swipe them from your lips with your tongue. It is always heart-wrenchingly painful to revisit the ghosts of the past. Now, full of hope that those same ghosts are hiding something quietly monumental from you, it’s a new kind of torment. It hurts to reopen the wounds of grief, and yet you find yourself afraid to pass over any single scar in case there’s a splinter of a promise hidden just beneath the abused flesh.   
  
Hours pass.   
  
You find _nothing_.  
  


* * *

  
You don’t sleep.  
  
You mean to avoid the town when you sluggishly head out to the stable the next morning. There are acres of untouched terrain for Lampos to enjoy without you ever coming within eyeshot of mortals.   
  
You tell yourself that you don’t want to see Meli or Calvus, that you don’t want them to fuss and worry at you until you confess everything to them, to treat you as if you are knee-deep in water at the bottom of a well and their care is the rope that will free you.  
  
You’ve seen that rope enough times to know it’s just as likely to hang you as it is to pull you into the light.   
  
You reassure yourself that it’s just Lynus you’re hiding from, that he’d be sure to ask _why_ you had fled the tavern, his tale at your heels, and that you don’t want to risk hearing a single thing more about the _others_. You’ve buried that hope alongside your Ender Chest. You can’t risk Lynus being the one to dig it up again, to reinvigorate it and let it soar into the clouds.   
  
You know how easy it is to shoot even the most high-flying of birds out of the sky, to watch them fall back to earth on the tip of an arrow. Your hope would plummet to the cold ground of reality just as brutally.  
  
You end up on the border of the township in spite of yourself, and the Voice refuses to cater to your self-deception in light of the danger it perceives there.   
  
_Avoid him._  
  
You see gleaming white fur out of the corner of your eye when you turn your back on the town.   
  
_Be vigilant.  
_  
You see a mossy cape disappear into the trees when you start the journey back home.  
  
_Don’t trust him._  
  
You see dark green eyes flash between branches in the nearby copse of spruce trees when you dismount Lampos and let him loose in the pasture.  
  
_Don’t be complacent_.  
  
You latch the lock on your door. The sill of the window is cool beneath your fingertips. You stare out at the quiet landscape.   
  
It feels like you’re just _waiting_ for something to change, to justify the anxious twist of anticipation twined around your throat.  
  
_Don’t let the mortals lead you down paths you can’t see_ , the Voice carefully enunciates. It wants you to listen. It needs you to obey. C _enturies of nothing, nothing, nothing. Nothing changes_.  
  
Nothing changes. You drag your tired eyes away from the window. You lie down heavily on your bed. The exhaustion from your night spent reading is creeping into your chest and threatening to pin you down.   
  
_You always **have** been alone…_  
  
You take a slow, deep breath, and let your eyes fall closed.  
  
_… and you always **will** be_.   
  


* * *

  
Your thoughts swim in and out of coherence – a horse is snorting angrily outside – you listlessly try to untangle the blanket coiled around your ankles – he’s urgently stomping his hooves into the dirt – there’s sweat cooling in the dips above your clavicles.  
  
_Danger_ , the Voice hisses.   
  
You roll over on to your stomach and lift yourself up to stare blearily out of the window above your bedframe.   
  
Someone is outside, muttering in the darkness.   
  
They’re leading Lampos _away_ from your house.  
  
_Hide_ , the Voice commands, but you ignore it in favour of lurching onto your feet, sheets a haphazard mess on the floor, and lunging for the sword in your equipment chest.   
  
You snag the burning torch on your bedside table. Your sword is heavy in your hand as you unlatch the front door and shoulder your way through it.   
  
You lift the torch high, casting the light a few feet ahead of you. You can’t hear Lampos. You can’t _see_ Lampos.  
  
You run towards the stable, praying to gods you’ve long since lost faith in that the last few minutes have been nothing but a tense hallucination.  
  
_Leave,_ the Voice urges you. _You’re in danger_.  
  
“Lampos!” Desperation tangles with brittle fear in your sleep-roughened voice. The stable is cold and empty.  
  
You hear the eerie clink of armour, the excited hum of distant voices, and lift your sword with a shaking hand. The air is icy against your fevered skin.  
  
_Run_ , and this time the Voice is _thunderous_ in your skull. _Now! Run!_  
  
You hesitate, backing slowly towards your house as you try to make sense of what is happening.   
  
There’s a group emerging from the spruce trees in shimmering enchanted armour. You can see glimpses of torchlight reflecting off polished _netherite_.  
  
Your grasp on your diamond sword briefly falters. You swallow down a gulp of frozen air, trembling, and kneel down to snuff your torch out in the dirt.   
  
_Get up_.  
  
You stagger backwards, away from the approaching threat.   
  
_Inside_.  
  
You turn towards your home.   
  
Oxygen sinks to the bottom of your lungs and stagnates.  
  
He’s standing on the threshold, _laughing_.   
  
“We didn’t get a chance to talk last night. Now seems like a good time, hm?”  
  
His face is illuminated by the inky glow emanating from the Ender Chest in his arms.   
  
_Your Ender Chest,_ the Voice snarls, and you lift your sword to level the tip with his throat. You’re standing only two feet apart. _Kill him_.  
  
“Lynus has a lot of stories, you know,” he continues, tone pleasantly conversational despite the bite in his smile, despite the weapon at his neck, despite the fear thrumming through you like electricity. “That’s the first time he’s ever spoken about _the Scribe_.”  
  
_Silence him._  
  
“Where’s my horse?” You can get another Ender Chest. You can find another town. You just need to make it out of here unscathed, need to escape before this too-familiar stranger can start asking questions only you have the answers to.   
  
“If you open this chest,” he says, and he shifts to the side just enough to avoid skewering himself on your sword as he takes a step closer to you, “what’s inside?”  
  
_Destroy him._  
  
“They say that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but I don’t think they ever considered someone like you might exist. There’s a _little_ _knowledge_ and then there’s an aeon of information contained in your slice of the End…”  
  
“Please.” He’s close enough for you to sink the length of your sword between his ribs. “I don’t want to kill you.”  
  
That cold green gaze slides from your dismayed expression and fixes on a point beyond your shoulder.  
  
“You misunderstand me,” he murmurs lowly to you, and he pushes the Ender Chest against your ribcage. You struggle to keep your grip on both your weapon and the chest, and he takes the opportunity to ease your sword out of your hand with another disarming leer. “I’m just the messenger.”  
  
There’s whooping and cheering growing louder behind you.   
  
“Dream!”  
  
_Escape. Escape. Run. Find a way out, now!_  
  
You flinch as the green-eyed man envelopes you in his arms and turns you to face the armoured party of four.  
  
“As we agreed, gentlemen.” You feel your own sword pressed against your back like the promise of a threat. “You recall the terms of our deal?”  
  
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” the first, the apparent leader, rattles off. “We see Tommy, we get a message to you ASAP. I got you, man.”  
  
“And in return,” another one steps forward, gesturing at you, “this is what we need to kill Technoblade?”  
  
_The Blade?_ _Kill the Blade?_ The Voice is high-pitched with incredulity. _They can’t **kill** the Blade._  
  
“In return, I give you access to centuries of knowledge,” Dream corrects the other male smoothly. “How you use it, I don’t care.”  
  
“This doesn’t feel right,” the tallest of the four says hesitantly. “I thought you were speaking about a book or – or a library. That’s… that’s a person.” Two different coloured eyes narrow at you from beneath the lip of a glowing helmet. “That’s a _frightened_ person.”  
  
“Ranboo,” one of them scolds softly.  
  
“Every library needs a scribe,” Dream says, and you feel your sword shift as he shrugs. “Take it or leave it.”  
  
“We’re taking it – I mean, um, you?” The shortest holds out his hand, and he’s close enough for you to make out the features of a teenage boy underneath all of that netherite. “Please come with us. We don’t want to threaten you! We’ll let you go, too, as soon as you’ve helped us!”  
  
“Helped you kill someone,” you croak out, and the Voice is _cackling_ so loudly that you’re starting to wonder how no one else can hear it. “I can’t help you kill someone. I can’t help you kill _anyone_.”  
  
Dream steps away from you, handing your sword off to a young, fox-featured man.  
  
“Any sign of Tommy,” he says to the boys, turning to head back to the road hidden by the trees, “you contact me, Quackity. _Me_.”  
  
“Yessir!” Quackity dips into a half-mocking bow.   
  
“And you,” Dream adds over his shoulder, “I’ll be seeing you soon, _Scribe.”_  
  
The sound of glass cracking cuts through the air and, with a cocky two-fingered salute, he disappears from view.  
  
The remaining four place their attention solely on you.  
  
“Get the horse,” Quackity orders, and the fox hybrid scampers off into the darkness. “Ranboo.”  
  
“I’m sorry,” the tall, heterochromic male says softly as he takes your Ender Chest from you. “I’ll look after it. I promise.”  
  
You’re struck dumb, too overwhelmed by the cacophony of amusement echoing in your head.   
  
“Are you alright?” The short, human-looking teenager is staring at you with something like concern.  
  
_Kill Technoblade_ , the Voice repeats between raucous bouts of laughter. Your vision swims disjointedly as its hysterics increase in volume. _Kill the Blade!  
  
_“Kill the Blade,” you echo feebly. Quackity and Tubbo nod in agreement. Ranboo fidgets uncomfortably at your side.   
  
“That’s the plan!”  
  
“He’s a war criminal!”  
_  
Fools_.   
  
“Fools,” you mutter, mouth dry and pliant under the stress of the night. The Voice places a few more words in your throat, pushing at the barrier between it and your consciousness to goad you into speaking for it. “ _Technoblade never dies_.”  
  
The world slopes onto a new axis and, wits flooded and drowned by the smug, cloying rain of the Voice’s bizarre glee, the ground swings up to meet you.  
  
You’re unconscious before you hit the earth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please leave comments/concerns/criticisms! I'm always happy to read feedback!


	3. There's Light On Every Burning Bridge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You relax against the solid heat of her torso. You feel like you’re being rocked gently back and forth with every step Lampos takes, and sleep rapidly starts to seem like an inevitability. 
> 
> You taste copper. 
> 
> Perplexed, you raise your free hand and touch it to your lips. There’s a damp, red stickiness on the pads of your fingers. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sure how I feel about this one. As always, unbeta'd, not yet edited. Small changes may occur.

Her hair tickles your neck as it moves in the breeze. You wrinkle your nose and turn your face against her warm chest. She has you tucked up in a blanket to keep the dusk chill out. One of her arms is wrapped around you, holding you steady where you’re seated on the saddle in front of her. The other is twined around the horse’s reins, and you reach out to hold onto the soft leather too.   
  
“Alright, dear heart,” she says, her voice a soft rumble that reverberates against your scalp. “Time to sleep, hm?”  
  
“Not tired.” There’s a chuckle against your cheek. “I’m _not_ tired.”  
  
“No, not at all,” she says, and you can hear the smile, the amusement, without raising your head. “Are you enjoying the walk?”  
  
“I can hear the river.” It’s a hundred or so yards away. It’s as far as you’re allowed to go on your own. “It’s noisy.”  
  
“The banks flooded during the storm a few days ago.” That makes sense. The rain had been loud and unrelenting for _hours_. “It’ll settle soon.”  
  
“Hm.” You take a slow, deep breath. She smells like cornflowers. “Are we going home?”  
  
“Do you want to go home?” You shake your head. “Well, we’ll finish our walk, then. Our boy needs his exercise as much as you need a nap.”  
  
You relax against the solid heat of her torso. You feel like you’re being rocked gently back and forth with every step Lampos takes, and sleep rapidly starts to seem like an inevitability.   
  
You taste copper.   
  
Perplexed, you raise your free hand and touch it to your lips. There’s a damp, red stickiness on the pads of your fingers.   
  
“Mama, something’s wrong,” you say, and your words are thick with the blood settling in your mouth. You feel sickened and disoriented by the sudden bitterness at the back of your throat. “Mama?”  
  
 _“Are you okay?”_  
  


* * *

  
“Are you okay?”  
  
You’re side-saddle on a horse and cradled carefully against someone’s chest. The horse comes to a sudden, jolting stop, and you feel the poor creature’s muscles stiffen beneath you when someone tugs sharply at his reins.   
  
Your head aches, there’s blood seeping from your gums, staining your tongue, and the Voice is little more than a dull drone in the back of your head.  
  
“I think she’s awake,” is lowly, morosely announced from behind you. You think it’s the tall, anxious boy, but you’re not convinced you’re capable of opening your eyes to check quite yet. He has an arm respectfully anchored around your middle, holding you enough to keep you steady on the horse and no more, as if he’s afraid that a tighter embrace would upset or harm you. “Are you okay?”  
  
“We really need to get her a healing potion, Q. We can stop off at—”  
  
“No.” Q sounds tiredly, ruthlessly determined when he interrupts the shortest of the group. “We get what we need, then we play nice.”  
  
“She hit her head pretty hard, though.” That’s the fox hybrid, you’re almost certain. He’s speaking from the other side of the horse, flanking you. “Maybe just a sip? She might not be much use if she’s concussed.”  
  
“Listen!” Lampos snorts hotly at the sudden increase in volume, and you feel the answering tug of his reins in the way his neck jerks against your legs. You dredge up the energy to open your eyes. The road is still dark. You don’t recognise your surroundings. “We can’t afford to be all sweet and _kind_ right now! We have to be focused! Once we’re back in L’Manberg, we interrogate the old man—”  
  
“Interrogate?”  
  
“—and then we take Technoblade in for the trial. If Dream’s right, and she’s got all this epic information just waiting in that Ender Chest, then she’s our best chance at making this whole thing fool-proof.”  
  
“I still don’t get how he’s going to win if it’s four against one anyway.”  
  
 _Complacent_.  
  
The Voice is subdued now, quieted, perhaps, by the concussion that you think is the cause behind the unbalanced feeling in your stomach, but it purrs the word against the back of your skull with no small measure of amusement.   
  
_Let them try. Give them what they think they want. They might give you information. Let them think you’re helping.  
  
_ “Maybe I can help,” you pipe up, managing little more than a miserable croak, “if you tell me what’s going on.”  
  
The shortest one – who, with his helmet off and tucked beneath his arm, you can now see is a goat hybrid – immediately perks up at your interest.  
  
“I’m Tubbo!” He waves up at you excitedly. “I’m really sorry that you got hurt! I swear we didn’t do that!”  
  
“You fainted,” the one trying his best to keep you safely on your horse says. “I tried to catch you, but it was so sudden… and, uh, I’m Ranboo.”  
  
“They call me Fundy, and I think my Grandpa’ll be able to help when we go visit him,” the fox hybrid states cheerfully. “He’s great! I bet he can fix you right up, actually! Q, maybe he can—”  
  
“Leave it.” Q _– Quackity_ , the Voice slurs disdainfully – refuses to look anywhere but at the road ahead. “I already said we’d deal with it.”  
  
“I’m sure I have a spare potion _somewhere_ ,” Tubbo muses aloud. “I’ll check when we get into town. It’ll take the edge off.”  
  
“That’s kind of you,” you murmur warily, “but I meant for you to tell me about Technoblade.”  
  
The Voice hums, _preening_ , the second you say that name.  
  
“What do you mean?”  
  
“I don’t know who that is.” Ranboo shifts uncomfortably behind you. “You said something about a war criminal?”  
  
“What did you mean when you said ‘Technoblade never dies’ before you passed out?” Ranboo asks, suspicion mingling with confusion in his words.  
  
“I don’t think it meant anything at all,” you lie. You can still feel the unnatural way your mouth had twisted when the Voice had placed the words on your tongue and breathed them out between your teeth. “I wasn’t thinking.”  
  
“He’s an incredible fighter,” Fundy says, sounding awed.  
  
“He betrayed us and caused a lot of damage to our home,” Tubbo explains with a shrug of his shoulders, “and I thought we were friends once.”  
  
“I don’t really know him,” Ranboo whispers. “I’m just… yeah, I’m just here.”  
  
“He’s retired now,” Fundy adds cheerfully.  
  
“He’s in _hiding_ ,” Quackity states with an air of finality, “and he’s _dangerous_. People like him don’t get to hide from the consequences of their actions just because no one is willing to step up and take the risk. He’ll get his punishment. No one’s unkillable.”  
  
The Voice laughs sharply and it sends your head spinning. You hastily grab Ranboo’s arm to pull yourself over the side of your horse and vomit onto the ground.   
  
A cool hand settles on your forehead while you pant from the exertion of emptying your stomach.   
  
“She’s too warm,” Ranboo says, and you’re sure he’s scowling as he eases you back against his chest. You go willingly, utterly drained by the events of the night. “ _Quackity_ —”  
  
“I _know_ , okay? We’re almost at the old man’s house. Just… don’t _drop_ her or whatever.”  
  
“Oh! New rule!” Tubbo calls out, and he starts to remove the rest of his armour. Quackity and Fundy follow suit ahead of you. Ranboo, you realise, has already divested himself of his netherite.   
  
You choose not to comment on the blood-stained aprons the three on foot are wearing. Instead, your attention is monopolised by the bizarre stage you’re approaching. There’s a small, cage-like cubicle beside a tall scaffold wrapped in redstone wiring.  
  
There’s a lever at the very bottom.  
  
Fundy reaches up to help you slide off Lampos’ back, and you can’t help the noise of frustration that escapes you when Quackity disappears with your horse as soon as Ranboo’s feet touch the ground.   
  
“Do you want me to carry you?” Fundy offers. You shake your head. You need to be on your feet in case an opportunity for escape arises. “It’s not far!”  
  
He takes your arm, almost gentleman-like if not for the blood on his clothes and on your face, dripping from your nose, settled in your mouth, and you watch as Ranboo and Tubbo walk off to one side, locked in quiet discussion. Ranboo has your Ender Chest tucked protectively under one arm. Tubbo appears to be gently soothing the worried dip in the Enderman hybrid’s brow with his words.   
  
It’s starting to rain.  
  
“Let’s do this,” Quackity says on his return. Lampos is nowhere in sight. “The quicker we find Technoblade, the better.”  
  
“C’mon! Grandpa’ll help you!”  
  
You are led to a house just a few metres from the stage. Fundy abandons you against Ranboo’s side to excitedly ring the bell at the door with Quackity and Tubbo. You cringe at the obnoxious noise, and Ranboo tentatively places a sympathetic hand on your shoulder.   
  
“You can ring it once! I’m right here!” A blond man with dark, tall wings opens the door. He seems to be both amused and irritated by the intrusion, though his face momentarily darkens at the sight of the blood on their aprons. “What’s with the getups?”  
  
“I got a job!”  
  
“They were cooking.” The stranger looks as unconvinced as Ranboo sounds. You start to wonder if he actually knows what his friends have been up to or if he’s as in the dark as you are.  
  
“We _were_ cooking!”  
  
“Potatoes! Sweet potatoes!”  
  
“We need to talk,” Quackity says firmly.  
  
“Listen, come in. It’s raining.” The man shakes his head and heads back into his home, and Ranboo helps you follow the other three inside. “It’s clearly not washing the blood off—”   
  
He cuts himself short at the sight of you.   
  
“What the _hell_ have you lot done?”  
  
“Enough!” Quackity is quick to take charge as soon as you’re all over the threshold. “We have a simple request: we are looking for Technoblade. I don’t think you should ask why, and I don’t think you should make any questions—”  
  
“You don’t think I should ask any questions?”  
  
“—and you, as a loyal citizen of L’Manberg, should care about this as much as we do—”  
  
“You are my Grandpa, after all!”  
  
He’s starting to look less amused with every word the boys speak, and he eyes Ranboo distrustfully when he carefully places your Ender Chest on a nearby table so he can better help you stay on your feet.  
  
“Just tell us where he is.”  
  
“I’m not gonna tell you. That’s just not gonna happen. He’s changed his ways. He’s not the same person.”  
  
“That doesn’t change what he did to us—”  
  
“He spawned _Withers_ where your house _literally_ stands and blew up everything!”  
  
“This isn’t a request! It’s a demand!”  
  
“Do it for L’Manberg, Grandpa!”  
  
You’re starting to quickly lose track of the overlapping conversations.  
  
“So, first of all, where do you think this loyalty to L’Manberg is? I’m pretty new here – if anything, _you_ need to prove to _me_ that I should care. Also, Techno and I go way back. We do _not_ rat out one another.”  
  
“Yeah, but I’m your _grandson_ , and I—”  
  
“I do _not_ care. My grandson is covered in blood looking like he’s just kidnapped and assaulted a woman!”  
  
Ranboo staggers under your weight when your knees buckle beneath you. He eases you down onto the floor and helps you sit up against a wall as chaos erupts around you. He presses the back of his hand against your head and, apparently not at all pleased with the heat he finds there, starts murmuring meaningless platitudes to you in the hopes of slowing your laboured breathing.   
  
You feel so _dizzy_.  
  
The blond man’s voice is raised in anger. The shattering of glass is even louder in your ears. Ranboo looks up, confused and shocked, and you both watch as the other three start to ransack the house, intent on pulling it apart and destroying it until Tubbo makes a triumphant noise, and suddenly the noise settles into a brief silence.   
  
“What is that?”  
  
“ _Shit_.”   
  
“Philza!” Quackity sounds hysteric. “What the _fuck_ is this?”  
  
 _Philza, Philza, Philza_.  
  
“It’s nothing. It’s nothing at all.”  
  
“I wanna see it!”  
  
“This is a compass with _Technoblade_ engraved on it! Why are you carrying this around?”  
  
“It doesn’t – it – it takes you to – to, like, a potato farm. It’s not… it doesn’t take you to…”  
  
“Philza,” Quackity says, suddenly in the older man’s face, “never forget that you weren’t co-operative with us today.”  
  
“You’re _really_ not selling this whole loyalty thing to me.”  
  
“This is like treason,” Tubbo says, and he holds his hand out to Ranboo, who is still crouched beside you. He guiltily hands over a cuff bracelet that glows hazily with enchantments. “You’re under house arrest until further notice. Put that on.”  
  
If looks could kill, you’d all be _dead_. The three rowdy young men file out of the house, compass in hand, and Philza pins Ranboo with a molten stare.  
  
“She fell,” the half-Enderman explains quickly as he stands to his full height. His presence in the room is much smaller than the livid man in front of him, ridiculously tall or not. He backs up towards the door. “I swear, we didn’t hurt her. She fainted.”  
  
“Get out. _Now_.” The furious expression on Philza’s face tells you that he doesn’t believe there was a ‘fall’.   
  
“I still love you, Grandpa!” Fundy calls through one of the broken windows.  
  
“You are fucking _dead_ to me,” Philza snarls in reply as the door closes behind Ranboo and their voices start to fade into the distance.  
  
His hands are curled into tight fists at his sides. He sucks in a slow, shuddering breath through his teeth. After a few seconds, Philza crouches down beside you. You muzzily stare back at him.   
  
The Voice is _singing_ his name to you.  
  
“Who are you?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for taking the time to trudge through this one!
> 
> Let me know your thoughts in a comment below!


End file.
